Royalty Reigns

Last night re-affirmed my belief that good karma comes to those who wait!  I am also of the belief that myself and my two gorgeous girlfriends must be good people to collect said karma.  This is how it all unfolded.....

My all-time, number one, favourite artist in the whole entire world is Prince.  I can still remember listening to him for the first time.  I was around nine years of age (circa 1984 - don't do the maths).  My older sister and her bestie - Tammy - were avid fans.  Tammy had a purple bedroom, plastered with posters.  She also had the most coolest purple guitar in the corner of her bedroom.  I was in awe of her coolness.  Her Dad was also a glazier, so her bedroom had full length mirrors on the walls.  The epitome of 80's coolness.  So I would listen to the music they listened to, and just loved the grooviness of Prince and his tunes.  Tammy said to me that when Prince finally came to Australia, one day, she would take me. Fab.

Fast forward to 1992, when Prince finally announced he would be touring Australia.  I was now 17, and Tammy was long gone in my life, but my bff's had finally caught on to what I had known all along.  Prince was the hottest artist in town. So we jumped on a train and went to our first ever concert.  BEST. NIGHT. EVER.

Press double fast forward now, to present time.  A month or so ago, Prince declared he would be touring again.  Hoorah!  I was thrilled that Hayles and Bec wanted to go.  Hayley jumped on line at 9am the Monday morning tickets went on sale.  At precisely 9.05am she had allocated tickets - right up in the "Gods" of Rod Laver Arena!  I was not bothered as I was going to see Prince!  Slightly bummed the next day when I realise two more concerts were for sale, with seats down low.  But I got on with life - I was going to see Prince!

So last night, we jumped in my car and travelled to the city.  Spent far too much time worrying about where the hell we were going to park, and whether we would be lucky enough to dodge the imminent rain on our walk to the arena.  Thank you Richmond Football Club for your open car park and thank you Mother Nature for turning off the water.

Excitedly entered the venue and found an usher to show us our seats in the northern hemisphere.  He asked us if we were all together to which we nodded.  He then walked off.  We were a bit confused, but then saw he had wandered down the small flight of stairs and was summoning us to join him.  "Give me your tickets girls, I need to change them over".  Huh??  Had we inadvertently found ourselves with scalper's tickets?  Were we in trouble?  "Just stay calm" he says.  He then handed us tickets for seats in the LOWER level - ROW G!!!!  Many expletives left my lips before I asked him his name.  "Allan" - couldn't help myself in the excitement - Allan........allan, allan, allan - was all I could say!  If you have no idea why I was blurting this out - watch this...

Allan!

I then asked if we could kiss him?!?!!?  As you do?  Of course he said Yes!  I could not believe our luck.  Or good karma?  Things like that just never happen to me, or my friends.  Thrilled beyond belief!  We very calmly (on the outside anyway) found our seats and were dumb-founded to see how close we were...

I spent the following few hours in awe of this amazing man and his talent.  It was like one big "jam".  Songs that I have listened to for nearly 30 years, live and right in front of me.  My feet were sore, my bladder was full (I couldn't miss a second for a toilet stop) and my hands stung from clapping.  A truly brilliant evening.

When we finally left, Hayley asked me if this concert was better than the first I saw?  I couldn't possibly compare.  The first concert you go to is always close to your heart, it's kind of a "right of passage" in my opinion.  And having the privilege of seeing the same artist some 20 years later.....you see it through different eyes.  Not just older, but more appreciative.

Here's a couple more pics from my most brilliant evening.

I'm still a little high from it all!  Who is your all-time favourite?  And have you seen them live?